Entourage & Exchange

[Brian McQuaig]

Bill Smith said:

I can't resolve your issue but thought I'd add my viewpoint.

Adam has touched on the problem which is your IT department and those
they hire are Windows-centric. Windows does not have a track record of
being compatible with anything else other than itself.

Entourage and a lot of network applications on the Mac platform are
based on standards outside of Microsoft's proprietary ways of doing
things. These are open standards that belong to no one whereas Microsoft
owns MAPI. Sure, MAPI works great just like Office for Windows runs
great on Windows running on an NTFS formatted hard drive. Microsoft owns
all of those technologies. But they don't freely share them with anyone
else.

The MacBU (yes, part of Microsoft but not Windows-centric) made a good
decision to use standards in developing Entourage rather than creating
another proprietary protocol application. The Mac OS X platform is not a
platform for promoting propriety. It has embraced open standards and the
MacBU has simply followed the Macintosh way rather than the Microsoft
way. Good for them. I applaud that.

I'm in Mac technical support myself, so believe me when I say I do feel
your pain. But if I were going to blame anyone it would be those that
think like Microsoft.

--

bill

William M. Smith, Microsoft Interop MVP - Mac/Windows
--------------------------------------

Bill: What a load of cogswaddle! I'm sure you're a really great guy and all; none of this is personal. But I've been around this biz since 1978 and this crud has been going on FOREVER.

When will good people in the MacBU understand that people don't buy MS Office(Mac) because it's a good product. They buy it because they expect it to interface with their Microsoft-centric networks and apps at work and/or school, period...end of story.

If I were king for a day, I'd wipe Redmond off the map. But the reality is the MacBU has screwed their customers with a substandard product that can't even interface properly with Exchange after HOW MANY ITERATIONS OF ENTOURAGE???!!!

I'm sick with all of the high-brow "embracing open standards" crud when the MacBU can't even see that their failure to interface properly and completely with Exchange has HURT people in their jobs, their schoolwork and their overall productivity. I'm IT support for MBA students and staff and have had students CRYING in my office because of the failure of Office 2004 & 2008 to work properly with Microsoft products. Please don't give me that MacBU vs Microsoft Redmond crud...YOU FOLKS ARE ALL WORKING IN THE SAME COMPANY.

Please get your collective acts together. Start using MAPI and .pst files. And put together a decent way to auto-archive the Exchange email like Outlook does. Better yet, delete all the code for Entourage and port Outlook (with the SAME feature set and functionality) over to Mac. THAT IS WHAT PEOPLE...EVERYDAY WORKING STUDENTS AND MAC BUSINESS PEOPLE WANT!!!

Brian McQuaig
UC Davis Graduate School of Management
Computer Services Group
Helpdesk Technician

 

[Jon]

FYI, definitely appreciate the comments but the "it should work" responses are a bit frustrating as it quite clearly does not yet.

I do have OWA, which has worked from day one:
https://exchange.liveoffice.com/OWA
login is (e-mail address removed) & password (no DOMAIN\ prefix or anything)

Putting that into Entourage 2008's wizard (the only way to get any kind of status code/log that I've found) results in:

1) Auto-detectFails, enter manually
2) Enter manually, verify, get dialog for user/pwd, enter that and get

Verifying Exchange account "(e-mail address removed)" on "https://exchange.liveoffice.com/OWA":
Verification Failed: "HTTP error. Access to the resource has not been authorized." (-18599 )

If you try https://exchange.liveoffice.com w/o the /OWA you get:

Verifying Exchange account "(e-mail address removed)" on "https://exchange.liveoffice.com":
Verification Failed: "HTTP error. The server cannot fulfill the request." (-18500 )

If you try https://exchange.liveoffice.com/exchange/[email protected] you get:

Verifying Exchange account "(e-mail address removed)" on "https://exchange.liveoffice.com/exchange/[email protected]":
Verification Failed: "HTTP error. Access to the resource has not been authorized." (-18599 )

and so on. I understand that for a lot of users it does "just work" but it clearly doesn't in all cases. There is some dependency other than "OWA n Exchange 2007" even if it's "as long as they haven't added layer x or enabled setting y." It would be great to know what that is.

IMAP has worked great since the first day we migrated our corporate mail outside, so there's that at least. (Address Book syncing to Exchange does not work though.)

Although I doubt that the reason that this isn't working is as simple as what liveoffice.com has claimed: "Apple does not support https." There have been some areas where things like iCal have had to be wrapped w/ stunnel to work with SSL connections, so I suppose something related could be happening.

 

[Paul_Barnard]

William wrote
"The MacBU (yes, part of Microsoft but not Windows-centric) made a good
decision to use standards in developing Entourage rather than creating
another proprietary protocol application. The Mac OS X platform is not a
platform for promoting propriety. It has embraced open standards and the
MacBU has simply followed the Macintosh way rather than the Microsoft
way. Good for them. I applaud that."

That is a nice touchy feely, open view point. I am afraid that from the perspective of a customer who has to work in a corporate environment, I really don't care if it is open standards or proprietary voodoo I just need it to work. Patently Entourage does not work with Exchange with anything like the integration that Outlook does. Quite frankly the MacBU programers should be made to work in the same Windows centric environment the rest of us work in. I suspect they would soon forget the holier than thou open standards hogwash. Sure if Exchange is going that way great but you should be following the server not trying to lead it.
This continued interconnectivity problem really causes us out here in the real world a hugh problem. I like Microsoft products but they really don't do themselves any favors. From my perspective Entourage 2008 is a significant downgrade from 2004...

 

[Dylan Carlson]

I am a customer who works in a corporate environment.

From my POV -- the usage of standard protocols is vital -- it is not ³holier
than thou². If everything was using open standards, software manufacturers
would instead compete on what really matters ‹ a better user-facing
experience instead of compatibility issues. In such a world, we would not
likely be having this conversation. If you don¹t care about open
standards, you should care, or you haven¹t been paying attention to the
major issues in the last two decades.

Although I think MSMBU should have also built standard Outlook-style MAPI
support into Entourage as well, and let the users decide. Would that have
resulted in more bloat & bugs? Probably. I think Microsoft¹s processes,
engineering and QA overheads are really high, which leads to product
sacrifices. Additionally, why they chose to go another way with Entourage,
using DAV instead of MAPI ‹ and different database engine -- was a strategic
choice rather than technical.

But then again, what do I know. I haven¹t written any PIMs lately.

Dylan

 

[Guest]

I've seen a couple of posts backing up my assertion that the MacBU has done the Mac community a disservice by giving us a "disabled" Entourage.

I've just heard from others on campus that Excel in Office 2008 (Mac) no longer has the Visual Basic functions. I need to mention that this is unverified information. If true, this means that our statistics students here at our MBA factory that use Macs will not be able to use Data Analysis Plus (Keller) or other add-ins that use VB. Just wanted to mention this...I'll move this particular discussion to an Excel forum.

What Dylan Carlson said in this discussion is true. If everyone used open standards there would be healthy competition. Unfortunately, to Microsoft, and "Open Standard" is one that they have complete control over.

I believe the MacBU is doing Redmond's bidding. The more they hamstring Office, the more people will be forced to buy a copy of Windows and PC Office. In all cases, follow the money. Sorry to be so cynical, but unfortunately, I wasn't born yesterday. Good thing is that their users are finally understanding this after being screwed so many times.

Brian McQuaig
University of California Davis
Graduate School of Management

 

[William Smith]

Hello, I have a client that just had his calendar get wiped off the
exchange server using Entourage 2004 SP2.

According to Tech Support and various articles on the web, this is not
an uncommon problem with Entourage 2004 SP2.

We're considering a 2008 upgrade, but only if the problem was fixed.

Does anyone know if the problem was addressed and/or fixed?

Hi Matthew!

Having supported many Macs with Entourage 2004 with Exchange and
participated in these newsgroups for several years I can't say that
disappearing calendar events is common at all.

If your tech support is the one claiming that various articles on the
web say this is common then I wouldn't believe them.

Could you please start a new thread with details of your problem, your
setup and what you've tried? I'm not saying we can resolve your problem
here but it's worth revisiting if you've tried posting here before.

--

bill

William M. Smith, Microsoft Interop MVP - Mac/Windows
Entourage Help Page <http://entourage.mvps.org/>
Entourage Help Blog <http://blog.entourage.mvps.org/>

 

[William Smith]

Although I doubt that the reason that this isn't working is as simple as
what liveoffice.com has claimed: "Apple does not support https." There
have been some areas where things like iCal have had to be wrapped w/
stunnel to work with SSL connections, so I suppose something related
could be happening.

Hi Jon!

Everything you've mentioned is in regards to using OWA for your server
address. My understanding of the discovery mechanism in Entourage is
that it's only for back-end servers where the proper DNS and DHCP
settings have been configured.

Your Mac receives an IP address from DHCP. It also receives from DHCP
additional information about your network such as DNS servers. DHCP can
also send along a myriad of other network parameters to your computer
such as log servers, time servers. One of these parameters must be
configured for Exchange Server discovery, which Entourage can use.

Exchange Server discovery can not happen over the Internet because
you're local service provider will not have configured its DHCP for
another network's resources. It will especially not work if you have a
home router handing out local DHCP addresses to your Mac.

Hope this helps!

--

bill

William M. Smith, Microsoft Interop MVP - Mac/Windows
Entourage Help Page <http://entourage.mvps.org/>
Entourage Help Blog <http://blog.entourage.mvps.org/>

 

[Jon]

Bill,

That's very interesting - has some odd implications though.

As it stands, it sounds like Entourage '08 won't work on any/most hosted Exchange situations (like what I have) but also wouldn't work with static IP addresses? There's a dependency on something above the pure TCP/IP config? That certainly sounds like a higher bar than the stated requirements of "Exchange with Outlook Web Access" for Exchange support.

Is there any way to avoid the discovery step? E.g. if they gave me the "true" server addresses rather than the front door. My config instructions for Outlook 2007 involve a number of proxy setups and do reveal a couple of other addresses. Those don't seem to work either, but perhaps that's a route to compatibility.

 

[zeman]

I work fine with entourage and my exchange server 2003.
Iwould like to know if anyone knows why mail sent from entourage is not synchonized in exchange server.
A sent message from entourage is not visible in other clients with outlook connected to the same server exchange.

Any help is really appreciated.

Thank you in advance

 

[Rafael]

Can I read/import my Outlook 2007 pst files from Entourage 2008?

 

[Adam Bailey]

Can I read/import my Outlook 2007 pst files from Entourage 2008?

Not directly, but there are other options for transitioning the content -
including across the Exchange server or using Outlook 2001 for Mac. See
<http://www.entourage.mvps.org/cross_platform/win_mac.html#pst> for more
information.

 

[Andy]

I think everyone is asking for a comprehensive list of new features in Entourage 2008 and there you go, I just noticed thru a Google search that we have got one here:
&nbsp;

Good reading ...

 

[William Smith]

Bill,

That's very interesting - has some odd implications though.

As it stands, it sounds like Entourage '08 won't work on any/most hosted
Exchange situations (like what I have) but also wouldn't work with
static IP addresses? There's a dependency on something above the pure
TCP/IP config? That certainly sounds like a higher bar than the stated
requirements of "Exchange with Outlook Web Access" for Exchange support.

Is there any way to avoid the discovery step? E.g. if they gave me the
"true" server addresses rather than the front door. My config
instructions for Outlook 2007 involve a number of proxy setups and do
reveal a couple of other addresses. Those don't seem to work either, but
perhaps that's a route to compatibility.

Hi Jon!

At the bottom of the first window of the Account Setup Assistant you'll
find a "Configure Account Manually" button. Click that and you can
manually set all information for your account. This will be the only
method you can use for hosted Exchange solutions.

Hope this helps!

--

bill

William M. Smith, Microsoft Interop MVP - Mac/Windows
Entourage Help Page <http://entourage.mvps.org/>
Entourage Help Blog <http://blog.entourage.mvps.org/>

 

[Richard]

I recently purchased the full upgrade version for Office (not student). I was upgrading from Office 2004. I am running Windows Server 2003 on my company network. The reason I purchased 2008 is because I was told the compatibility with Windows Server would be better.

To my disappointment, the Tasks in Entourage still do not sync with Server 2003.

Have you had any experience with the Tasks function in Entourage?

Any help is really appreciated.

Thank you in advance.

 

[GAT]

My Day - Microsoft missed the point again lol. My Day should be a Widget. Duh.

 

[Alex Alexzander]

I bought a new version of 2008 and installed it so I could get exchange support. I used the remove icon in the home and student version to remove office 2008 and then installed the regular version, and it assumes the old serial license. How to re-license this with the new license so I can get exchange to work?

 

[John]

Saying that I'm "upgrading" from 2004 to 2008 (using the Super Suite Deal, but it hasn't arrived yet) - but will no longer be able to check my Exchange mail - would be like buying a new car that only goes downhill. What in blazes was MS thinking by TAKING AWAY features?! I read the discontinued Super Suite Deal during November and December - the question was raised concerning Exchange functionality - and I don't ever remember any MS person stating that the limited functionality in 2004 was being eliminated in the same version of 2008.

That said, I'll log into my Exchange mailbox and FORWARD all of my mail to a non-exchange mailbox.

And Microsoft wonders why they're so despised - while Apple is loved? It's ALL ABOUT THE CUSTOMER and their experience. Apple gets it, MS doesn't.

 

[skipmartin]

I also have to add my 2 cents and say that I think it is ridiculous that Office 2008 does not support sync of Tasks and Notes to exchange.

What the heck? This was a big problem in the last version and yet again the corporate users have been slighted with only PARTIAL support for exchange. What are they thinking??

 

[Andy]

FYI: One more ...

Here is a blog which provides details on Entourage 2008 features realted to Exchange Server, take a look:

Entourage 2008 – New Features (Part II)
&nbsp;&lt;http://blogs.technet.com/amir/archive/2008/01/30/entourage-2008-new-features-part-ii.aspx&gt;

Good stuff!

 

[Matt]

Still having SIGNIFICANT issues with Entourage... Wiped my installation and did a fresh install of Office 08... When connecting to Exchange server I get the dreaded -17900 error (bad username or password). Both are confirmed correct. I can login via OWA with no problem. I can login via IMAP with no problem. Try and login in Exchange mode to get calendars, global address etc and I get the error.

Exchange server is 2003. Thought it might be an Active Directory issue or something with the existing mail account. So I worked with IT and set up a new mail account with a new AD user. Clean install of Office 2008 again... Still get the -17900 error and can't get Entourage to access the server. OWA and IMAP work...

What the &amp;*(^. It is unbelievable that a clean install of Entourage can't login to a clean account on Exchange server.

Any suggestions?!